


we are all going forward. none of us are going back.

by hasitsclaws



Series: we're inconsolable. [15]
Category: From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-02
Updated: 2014-07-02
Packaged: 2018-02-07 03:37:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1883895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hasitsclaws/pseuds/hasitsclaws
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He wonders if their story was always supposed to be as tragic as this.</p><p>part fifteen of the 'we're inconsolable' drabble series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we are all going forward. none of us are going back.

**Author's Note:**

> So this is the last part of the series. Are you crying? I'm crying. If you want to make the emotional turmoil worse, read "Crush" by Richard Siken and everything will make sense. Listen to the end of the series playlist I have up on my 8tracks like I did while writing this and killed myself if you want (http://8tracks.com/hasitsclaws/we-re-inconsolable-the-end-1). Why do I do these things?

In the beginning Seth didn't understand why he and Kate had such an obtuse routine where they dipped and dodged over each other like they were waiting to step on a landmine. How their hearts were still beating so in-tune it was like they were fucking right there on the dirty motel floor when he was just trying to get up the nerve to touch her face.

Maybe they never got past that. Maybe they never got past the hurt and the loss left over from that night so very long ago. Because even though they've tried to patch each other up for so long, they definitely still haven't gotten past Richie.

He wonders if their story was always supposed to be as tragic as this.

After they finally pick Richie up and away from Santanico's dead body, he clutches at Kate like a newborn does to their mother.

"He was wrong," Richie's sobbing. " _I loved her_. I loved her..."

"I know," Kate whispers, brushing Richie's hair away from his face, kissing his forehead in such an intimate gesture that even Seth has to look away. "I know, Richie. I'm sorry."

Seth thinks it all when down the drain when he finally gave into the urges of touching Kate, let her lick frosting off his fingertips and get a tattoo down the scar on her back.

He has a scar like that too, now, from a candy-apple haired hunter who was greedy for a chance at eternity, never ending. Sometimes he thinks that's funny-- how never turns people into monsters.

How never can hold so much when it's supposed to be empty.

They all settle down for a bit after leaving Santanico's body behind in the dusk.

They have to go deeper into the Underworld to get to the last Lord, a place called Mictlan that's in the deepest part of Xibalba. There's a staircase that looks a lot like one in that old castle in Mexico City, twists and turns leading down into the dark.

The hunting party sits at the top of it, fire made from dead bits of wood and a rusty Zippo one of the twelve remaining hunters, Libby, pulled out of her pocket. Freddie's still here too, Kill Bill Tara, Tico, Florence, Miguel, Dusty, Marie, Rufus, that pair from the beginning who talked about boats, Pierre and Anna, and another woman. A woman who looks familiar.

"You were at Chapultepec," Seth says as he eyes her. "Your name's Aziza."

"Yes," the woman says, firelight painting shadows on her dark skin.

"You had a kid," Seth says, frowning. "I paid you to go home."

"How could I ever go home when I know my daughter will never be safe with monsters like this out there?" Aziza asks, and Seth notices that there's blood and bits of flesh stuck in her hair.

And ge doesn't have an answer for her, just looks away, over to where Kate's sitting off to the side with Richie's head in her lap. If it were another time, another place, Seth might be jealous of how close they are, the sweet nothings Kate's whispering into his brother's ear. But they're in Hell right now, literally. And Richie's lost the only person he's ever truly felt like he belonged with, the only person that never picked anyone else over him, and Seth thinks it's good that Richie at least has Kate to nurse his wounds.

Seth's never been good with words, doesn't figure he can help too much.

He wanted so much to find Richie and end this, but now that he's found him, he doesn't want to see how things will play out.

"If we make it through this," Seth overhears Miguel whispering to Florence as false stars flicker on the horizon. "I'll follow you anywhere."

Florence smiles, the expression turning to surprise as Tico wraps an arm around her and Miguel. "We got another wedding in the future?"

"Another?" Freddie asks from where he's sitting a few feet away, talking to Tara and Libby quietly.

"Yeah," Tico says. "Anna and Pierre are finally tying the knot. Took the fuckers long enough."

"If we _live_ , that is," Anna says. "And Pierre will finally buy the beer."

"In your dreams, woman," Pierre answers, but he's laughing.

Seth is pulled away from the happy conversation by a sudden hand on his shoulder, turns and looks up at Kate. She nods over to where Richie's lying on the ground, back turned to the group.

"He needs you, not me," Kate says, and Seth swallows dryly, spit stuck in his throat as he stands.

When he approaches Richie doesn't move, so Seth just sits down behind his brother and begins rubbing his back. He did this when they were kids, when Richie got overwhelmed with the world and went goddamn near catatonic on him. It seems to work now like it did then, Richie's limbs loosening until her rolls on his side and meets Seth's eyes, finding him as always.

"I never should have chosen her," Richie whispers. "I knew it would end here."

"Is that the only reason why?" Seth asks, because he needs to know Richie wishes he could take it all back for more than heartache over some dead vampire bitc-- Seth stops himself, blinks down at his brother and the hurt there, the desperation.

 _Fuck_ , he thinks, because he finally gets it.

This entire time he's been playing Santanico off as the bad guy, and maybe she was, but in the lesser of two evils kind of way. After all, Santanico was just an innocent little girl once upon a time, didn't want anyone to be sacrificed. She defied, and the world took everything away from her, turned her into a monster desperate for blood. It took and took, and Santanico just wanted to take back.

Seth realizes it's the same with Kate, and that if he can love that girl so easily, it makes sense as to why Richie could do the same with Santanico. She gave him hope, after all. She gave him a place to belong in a way Seth was never capable of-- their entire lives Seth was trying to save his baby brother, when what he really needed to do was _find_ him.

Unfortunately, Santanico found Richie first.

"You know what," Seth says just when Richie opens his mouth to say something in response. "Don't answer that."

He remembers the way Kate shot two men in cold blood and he was fine with it.

How she kills and kills and kills and he's fine with that too, because he promised her once, a long time ago, that's what they were going to do until they finished this. He wonders that if they live, she'll give it up. That if they live, she won't be a monster anymore.

Seth wonders if he won't be a monster anymore, either.

Richie, too.

They're all about to lay down for shift naps when the howling starts.

The dog, who's somehow survived it all without a scratch, starts snarling and whining on his leash where he lies next to Kate. By now she's come to rest next to Richie and Seth, kissing the former softly, telling him he's okay, saying that her and Seth are here as Seth has his arms around them both, huddling for warmth.

"Something's coming," Tara says, the scarred side of her face stagnant while the intact side pulls down in a grimace.

"Mictlantecuhtli is known for his symbol of the dog," Freddie says, standing up and taking out his gun.

"So the fucker actually sent Hell Hounds after us?" Marie asks, helping Rufus to his feet-- he got injured back with Chalciuhtlicue, trying to help save Sasha and the three others (Seth has since learned them to be Sapphire, Rebecca and Shannon, all people, all dead for this). Rufus' leg is torn up a little, but Marie was able to tie it off so he can't bleed to death rigth away, but he's moving slow.

"Looks like it," Dusty says, blinking at vague, black shapes on the horizon. It's the first time he's spoken since Adam died, and Seth can see that he's still hurting, will hurt forever, probably.

The feeling's mutual.

Libby stands up then too, tan, freckled face heating in rage. "Oh, _fuck_ no. We ain't doing this Supernatural bullshit. Not today, eh."

"Then what do we do?" Anna asks.

"Run," Tara answers. "Now."

Seth looks over at Kate who's pulling Richie up, grabs both of their hands and makes a dash for it, the dog sprinting along behind them as the others follow.

Seth never pictured himself as a father.

Always had his brother to take care of so he didn't even think about kids.

But then Kate got pregnant, and that look on her face when she lost the baby was just... Seth's thought about it, about children, with her. They'd be pretty, and fierce like their mother. One of them would have Richie's eyes he's betting, has made a mental T-chart of recessive genes in his head.

He'd like it if they had a boy first, and then a girl. This way there'd always be a big brother to take care of her. And then maybe a little brother or little sister to toddle after them, giggly and happy and he and Kate sit back on some porch and drink lemonade because she hates when his breath smells like Corona.

She'd ask him when Richie's coming to visit next, off exploring the world like he dreamed about when they were children. Seth would smile and say in a week, like clockwork, and they'd be happy. They'd be normal.

But it can't be like that-- it's never been meant to be like that, not yet.

They make it to the bottom of the steps just as the dogs close in on them. There's a big door, looks like the ones at the front of the Twister, Tetris pieces fitting together until they open up.

"Go!" Tico screams. "Someone has to close them!"

"We're not leaving without you," Kate says, trying to grab for the man's hand, but Richie pulls her through the doorway and Tico closes the doors behind them, gears locking into place. " _No_!" Kate yells, banging on the doors but it doesn't make a sound. "No, no, n _o_!"

Seth looks away in shame, because he was the one that was pulling Richie who was pulling Kate.

He notices then they're in a big, empty room. It isn't golden though, isn't white either. It's a deep, dark blue, and the floor ripples wherever anyone steps. There isn't a sound from anywhere either, no one talking, just harsh breathing and the dog whimpering in grief.

Finally, Miguel starts crying and everyone just sort of joins in. The fourteen of them all fall in a heap and cry and cry and cry until it's like the room is overflowing in tears. It's full of pain and loss and fear and grief. It's full of dead families, lovers, children, friends. Because life has been easy for none of them, but no one ever truly gets used to losing someone that they love.

Seth thought if they were dead, he'd love Kate even more, but that's not possible.

That night in the warehouse kind of proved it, how far he's willing to go to get her back. He was ready to kill his own brother if it meant saving her, but now he realizes that at the time he was just blinded by rage and jealousy, because he knows Kate would never let him kill Richie in the first place.

He means too much to the both of them.

After the room comes a road, a road like the one they first drove away from the Twister on, endless stretch of Mexican highway.

It's still night out, but there are no more fake stars.

Seth watches numbly as Richie holds Kate's hand, thinking that maybe he's the one meant to die here, that Kate and Richie are gonna get out of this and be happy. He realizes that maybe he'd be okay with that, that maybe Richie's had some cosmic claim on her since the start.

But then Kate smiles over at him, and Seth realizes he can't let go. She's not his brother, he knows that-- and maybe he's a fucking bastard for admitting to himself he loves her more than life itself, but he's never kept things like that bottled up when it comes to Richie, so it should okay with Kate too, right?

"You think you get trapped here, when you die?" Miguel asks, and he looks so fucking _sad_ , this big brute of a man with tear-swollen eyes, that even Richie takes pity on him and shakes his head.

"Xibalba is for Gods only," Richie says. "Your friends-- _our_ friends, they're somewhere good. Maybe not heaven, but somewhere good."

"Like El Rey?" Freddie jokes, and it's just funny enough to only feel mildly like a punch to the gut.

"Yeah," Richie laughs. "Like El Rey, I guess."

After that night in Mexico City, Seth really started wondering if his brother was actually dead.

And then when him and Kate got married, and they knew Richie was there, he figured no, probably not.

That hurt more than if Richie had been long gone and buried.

They lose Pierre and Anna to more Gods of Death.

Chamiabac and Chamiaholom bring the other hunters back as skeletons. Seth can't tell which from which, but you'd think since they're all nothing but bones now, they'd be easier to kill.

They've made it past the highway at this point, in some kind of twisted neighborhood like something you'd see in the nice parts of Mexico, big houses in a fancy gated community. They hole up in a big, abandoned mansion that looks like one Seth and Richie tried to rob just a couple months into the conning business.

Freddie and Tara board the doors while the others barricade the windows, and they all wait as skeleton after skeleton bangs on the walls, trying to break in. Anna's been injured by one-- they use their limbs as weapons, cut her stomach open and she's dripping blood all over where she sits pressed up against a lavish sofa in the parlor.

"My backpack," she wheezes. "I can buy you time."

"What do you mean?" Kate asks, hands pressed to her bloody face in sadness.

"We brought a bomb," Pierre says from where he's holding Anna's hands tightly clasped in his own. "Figured we'd go out in a bang if we had to." He laughs at his own joke, but chokes on the sound with a sob.

"No," Anna says, lips trembling and leaking blood. "You can still make it."

"Not without you," Pierre says. "It took me six years to finally fucking kiss you, and ten to get you to marry me. I am not going to waste another second, Anna. Not now."

Anna laughs too, but much like Pierre moments earlier it turns into a sob. " _Eísai ilíthios_ ," she says.

" _Je suis un idiot_ ," Pierre agrees.

The bomb is a simple homemade explosive, but it's wrapped in C-4 and Seth wonders how the fuck that didn't explode with all the movement they've had since they got here. He doesn't linger on it, helps trigger the wires as the skeletons start to smash through the barricades at the windows, nods to the pair of hunters in confirmation as he gives them the detonator.

"A cell phone?" Pierre smirks.

"I'm a sucker for nostalgia," Seth says.

"You don't call until you're all out. Even Rufus, bad leg or not," Anna says, and Seth can see she's fading fast, knows she'll be gone in an instant-- he understands why Pierre won't leave her behind.

The pair is a lot like him and Kate, in a way. Came together out of tragedy, took too long to admit how they felt. And now it's over, end of the line just like that.

Seth realizes with sudden clarity that he doesn't want to end up like them, watching her die and wanting to die himself. He promised her twenty-one and got her there, but what about twenty-two, twenty-three? What about thirty, fifty, seventy-five? What about one hundred, where she's old and wrinkled and has lived a fantastic life, with adventures and babies and love? Dies warm and safe in her bed, meets him in heaven or El Rey or whatever is waiting for them?

He realizes that maybe she was wrong, that love isn't watching someone die-- it's watching them _live_.

"You give the others a thank you for me, yeah?" Seth asks, and Pierre nods as he fits himself around Anna's side and she rests her head on his shoulder, closing her eyes and breathing shallowly.

"You give those Gods hell for us," Pierre counters.

Seth touches the man's shoulder, one final promise before he pulls the others up the stairs, onto the roof. Jumping over to the next house is hard with Rufus' bad leg way getting in the way, but they make it just as the skeletons and Gods get into the house, bones rattling.

Sighing, Seth looks down at the cell phone, his hands shaking.

Kate takes it from him within that moment, and when he looks at her she's smiling at him sadly as she hits _send_.

Tara gave them a glimpse of what it's like to have a family, one that's not as fucked up as it's always been. She brought the others, and they were all one big mess, but they were good, they were happy, they were _free_.

But then Seth went and screwed up by dying, and Kate screwed it up more by having Richie bring him back. And they screwed it up worse by agreeing to this, but it's fate, really, if you believe in such a thing.

Mictlantecuhtli and his wife, Mictecacihuatl's house is the biggest in the neighborhood.

It's tall, columned and covered in Spanish moss. Seth finds that last part ironic, but just snorts, following the others through the front gates made of petrified blood. Miguel touches one of the pickets and it shatters, only to rebuild itself anew within and instant.

"I gotta get me one of these," Miguel says to Florence and Dusty.

Freddie rolls his eyes, Tara and Libby close behind, Marie helping Rufus limp after, Aziza following up the rear.

Seth glances over at Kate and Richie, the way they're still pressed close. He's so busy studying that, how his brother and his wife are so in-sync, he doesn't notice the trap until it's too late.

The net snares Kate and Richie easily, springs forth from the front doorway and entangles them before sucking them inside.

" _Seth_!" Kate screams, Richie trying to grab the door frame so they aren't pulled in.

" _Kate_!" Seth yells back, begins running up, hand reaching out, fingers so close to her own before the door slams shut in his face and they're gone. "Shit!" Seth says, kicks at the door. "Fuck! Fuck you! Open up! _Fuck_!"

"Seth," Freddie says, grabs his shoulder but Seth tries to fight him off, gone wild in sudden panic. "Seth, listen, listen!"

With Dusty's help he manages to wrangle Seth down onto the porch, hold him still until he's gasping for air and looking up at them. Seth suddenly realizes he's crying, thinks his family is dead.

"If they wanted them dead," Tara says, and Seth realizes he must have said his thoughts out loud if she's answering them. "They would be dead."

"Then why'd they take them?" Seth asks, feels like he's going to pass out from all the fear and hysteria.

"Not them," Marie says. "But Kate."

" _What_?" Seth asks, blinking in shock.

"They wanted Kate," Rufus answers, sitting down on the porch steps and lighting a cigarette-- Seth sniffs and realizes that it isn't actually a cigarette though.

"Why?" Seth asks, Dusty and Freddie finally dubbing him sane enough to let him sit up.

"Why did Tanner want her?" Freddie asks. "Because she's pure."

"Kind of took away that card a long time ago, buddy," Seth scowls, none of this making sense.

"Not pure of body, idiot," Tara says, smacking Seth in the face. It makes his ears ring, before suddenly everything comes into focus and her words start making sense. "Pure of heart. They want her because she's pure of heart."

"To sacrifice?" Seth asks, panic beginning to return anew.

"No," Freddie says. "To replace Santanico."

Kate always has had sympathy for the devil, preacher's daughter or not.

They get into the house through a storm door in the basement.

There aren't guards, just hundreds of rotting corpses Mictlantecuhtli is waiting for to turn to bones. Seth covers his nose and tries not to gag, tip-toeing around severed limbs and crusted locks of hair. Aziza is in front of him, shaking the way she did back in Mexico City. Seth wishes she'd have cut her losses and gone home with her daughter. He knows Kate wanted them both to live, didn't want that little girl to lose her momma the way Kate had lost her own.

Florence and Miguel have torches, something straight out of Indiana Jones and Seth really hopes this stays Temple of Doom like usual. He doesn't have an excuse to get out if it goes Crystal Skull, especially when the King of the Underworld is going to turn his wife into a fucking vampire.

They get up to the back steps and into some kind of maid's hall when suddenly a heard of what looks like little lizards with goat hoofs attack them. One bites Aziza and she screams, takes out a gun and shoots it before it can take a chunk out of her. Another jumps on Miguel's face and he starts cursing abundantly in Spanish, trying to pry it off.

"Shit," Seth says as one jumps for him, raises up the shotgun Dusty tosses to him and plays baseball with the little fucker before it can claw his throat out.

"What the fuck _are_ these things?!" Libby shouts, kicking them away from her.

"Chupacabras!" Freddie yells, shooting one after the next.

"You gotta be kidding me," Seth says, tosses around with another one that attacks him until they go crashing into a window. The frame breaks and Seth flails half-way out into the backyard, blinks as he looks over at a barn and hears animals making noises and the creature attacking him bites his hand. "Fuck!" Seth says, tosses it out the window.

It looks like it's about to come back at him when suddenly a goat trots out of the barn and into a pen, and the chupacabra dashes away, tackles the goat, and starts eating it. Seth blinks again, rights himself and looks at the melee going on before him before sticking two fingers in his mouth and whistling.

Surprisingly, everything stops and looks at him.

"Super's up, guys," he says, gesturing out the window.

The chupacabras just stare at him, before the sound of the goat screaming as their little friend eats him reaches their ears. The monsters all turn to each other and make some weird noise, before letting everyone go and dashing out the window one after the next, Seth backing up to make room for them.

When they're gone and more goats start making sound from inside the barn, Seth just looks over at the others and shrugs. "I'm supposed to trick our way out of here, right?" he asks.

Sometimes he thinks about what it would have been like if Kate had really been their sister.

Probably still fucked up, he reasons, but he thinks they might have been happy, the Richie might've never left.

The next task comes in the kitchen, where old fat men are laughing and eating dead children.

Seth stops in the doorway and thinks he's going to vomit again, but it's like a car wreck and he can't look away until someone taps him on the shoulder. He turns and sees Rufus, the way the old man is sweating profusely, how his eyes are yellow and his body is drained, the way Marie is dancing anxiously on her feet behind him.

"You get her out of here, alright?" Rufus asks, nodding at his partner with a very serious expression.

"Alright," Seth says.

Rufus just grins, limps into the kitchen like he owns the place and takes out his pistol. "Alright, motherfuckers," he says as the old fat men look up at him, bits of hair and skin stuck in their fangs. "Who wants to die first?"

Seth and the others sneak past, Marie lingering at the opposite doorway in the living room before Seth pulls them along just as they hear Rufus start to play eeny-meeny-miney-moe for who to empty the clip into.

There's a staircase past the living room, but the stairs are flat, one long slide. Seth stares at them like it's one of the many jigsaw puzzles he and Richie worked on as kids, trying to figure out how this works.

"Maybe it's a riddle," Tara says.

"The last time I had a riddle it was the price of a good bottle of hooch, Kill Bill," Seth snorts.

"And what was that price?" Tara asks.

"Fuck if I know, that was nearly four years ago," Seth says.

"Think," Tara snaps.

Seth rolls his eyes, remembers how that was the world he first saw Richie feed in, how that clerk they killed mocked and mocked and how Dad said to do it faster, do it right. "Fourty-six o'two," Seth says.

And quite suddenly, there's the sound of grinding gears, the stairs cranking until they're ready to climb just as shooting begins in the kitchen.

"That's our cue," Marie says, taking the first step. "Let's not waste Rufus' life for nothing."

The first time they had sex on their own, after that once with Richie, Seth was so nervous he thought he was going to puke.

"I want it to be good for you," he said, touching Kate's cheek softly.

"It's not my first time, Seth," she joked, but he could see that hurt her, shame and regret and need filling her up.

"Who says?" he asked. "It can be if you want it to."

"I want it to," she whispered. "But I'm scared."

"Me too, baby girl," he chuckled, leaning in to kiss her. "I'm always afraid."

And he'd never made love to anyone so tenderly in his life, not even Richie. It was soft and fumbling and full of laughter, soft kisses and shaking touch. Afterwards sex turned into a punishment for each other more than anything else, but that first time? That first time he'll never forget.

 

They lose Miguel on the second floor.

One of the hounds from earlier is standing guard for the doorway into the master bedroom. It goes for Florence who's heading the pack and Miguel throws himself in the line of fire, manages to cut the thing open with his machete before he falls to the ground, stereotypical mustache soaked in blood and guts and Seth thinks that's one hell of a stereotype to die with, and he's crying because _fuck_ , he doesn't want to lose another friend, not like this.

"Tell Ishaan I'm sorry I'm gonna miss his little league game on Sunday," Miguel says, reaching up to touch a lock of Florence's hair tenderly.

"But you will be there," she smiles through her tears. "You and his daddy are both gonna be watching it from heaven."

"Yeah," Miguel chuckles, coughs up some blood onto Florence's t-shirt. He turns to Freddie, looks up at his brother-in-law and flips him the bird. "That's for banging my sister."

"Love you too, man," Freddie says, holds back a sob and shakes his head, stuffing a hand over his mouth.

"And Seth?" Miguel says, looking up at him meaningfully.

"Yeah, buddy?" Seth asks, bends down and takes Miguel's hand in his own.

"You get Katie back," Miguel says, and it's the most serious Seth's ever seen the man, here, at the end of all things. "No matter what, you get her back."

And Seth knows what he means, but he says, "I will," anyways.

Okay, so Richie was right, Seth and Kate _did_ have sex while she was wearing the wedding dress.

But the sex wasn't really what mattered, just like it wasn't what mattered that first time. What mattered was that they were laughing and kissing and talking about small, wonderful, stupid things, holding hands like two normal idiots in love. What mattered was that they had intimacy, a kind of intimacy Seth never had with his brother.

Maybe that's why Seth lost Richie-- so he could find Kate instead.

After all, Xbalanque once tried to steal away the daughter of the earth Goddess the same way Richie tried to steal away Kate. But in the end, Seth was the one she turned to. Kate's always liked dawn more than dusk, so maybe it makes sense she didn't choose the hidden sun.

When they open the doors to the master suite, they aren't in a regular house anymore.

It's a wide open space, transforming shape until suddenly bright neon lights flash around them, bad mariachi music, the smell of body glitter and tequila and sex. Seth blinks and suddenly he's in the Titty Twister again, everything full swing, alive and undead all the same.

On the main stage he sees Kate and Richie tied to the stripper's pole, their mouths gagged, both of them struggling for his attention. When he looks behind himself he sees that he's totally alone, the others vanished.

He'd worry that they were dead if he wasn't suddenly preoccupied, two tall figures coming out from behind the curtains. They have the bodies of skeletons, heads like candy skulls. Their jaws hang open to catch the stars during the day, and the male is wearing a headdress of owl feathers and paper trinkets as well as a necklace strung with human eyeballs.

"Welcome, Hunahpu. So we meet again," the male skeleton, Mictlantecuhtli, says.

"Yeah, how you doing?" Seth scoffs, focuses his attention in on Kate and tries to see if he's too late.

"Your friends were wrong, Maya Twin," the female skeleton, Mictecacihuatl, says, guessing at what he's thinking. "We don't want to turn the girl."

"Then what _do_ you want?" Seth asks.

"We want a baby," Mictlantecuhtli says, flooring Seth for a moment. "And she and your brother are going to give it to us."

"Sorry to disappoint you, Ramrod, but that didn't really work out the last time," Seth says, calm as ever. But inside he's shaking with rage, wants to tear them apart. Can't though, not yet when he's got to be believable, like Pacino or Brando. He's got to play the game, pull the trick off. "Or did you not notice?"

"Did you not notice we are _Gods_?" Mictlantecuhtli says, and even though his face is nothing but skull Seth knows he's smirking.

"Why do you want a half-vampire, half-human baby anyways?" Seth asks.

"Because it comes from a Maya Twin and a girl filled with light," Mictecacihuatl answers. "It'll be an unstoppable force of nature."

"I got an unstoppable force of nature for you," Seth says, takes out the knife he slipped off Richie right before he got taken into the house, wanted to finish this himself so his brother didn't have to push himself after losing Santanico.

Mictlantecuhtli laughs. "You think that can kill _me_?" he asks. "That, made of the original bones one of your people stole? Fool, I _am_ the original bones."

Seth blinks, looking down at the knife and then back up, wondering if he's been played.

"Pathetic human," Mictlantecuhtli says. "You've grown dumber with age."

Clenching his hand tighter around the knife, Seth gathers every ounce of courage in his body and leaps. He gets within inches of Mictlantecuhtli, stabbing the skeleton through the ribs and right up into his beating heart that pounds red and glowing--

\--only to be smacked backwards, landing at Kate's feet.

When he looks up at her dazedly, it's to see she's crying, struggling to get free and help him. Seth wants to say it's okay but his mouth is full of blood, and suddenly Mictlantecuhtli picks him up by the front of the shirt, holds him in the air and puts a rip in Richie's sweat jacket.

"I am going to kill you for good this time, Hunahpu," the God says. "No more _tricks,_ no more rebirth. Just good, old fashioned _dead_."

Kate screams again behind her gag, Richie too.

"Come now, dear," Mictecacihuatl says. "You mustn't stress our surrogates out so much. At least let them say goodbye before you kill him."

Mictlantecuhtli rolls his eyes, and even through the blackness dotting his vision, Seth thinks that's a very funny image to see about until suddenly he's dropped back on the floor again. When he looks up this time, Kate and Richie are magically freed and rush to his side, scooping him up and holding him tight.

"I love you," they say. "You came for us."

"Always," Seth says, breathing in the scent of them, sweet and musky and covered in blood.

"How touching," Mictlantecuhtli says tiredly. "You humans are so ruled by your emotions. Even when you're not human, you still are."

"I'd still be human if it weren't for _you_ ," Richie snarls at the Gods.

"You mean if it weren't for Santanico, dear," Mictecacihuatl says, inspecting her painted on nails in a bored fashion. "Besides, _you chose this_. And for what? Because you thought your brother didn't love you anymore?"

Seth looks over at Richie, a million questions swimming in his head but the shame in Richie's face says it all. And _shit_ , Seth thinks. This whole time he thought Richie left for something better, when really he left because he thought he wasn't good enough.

"You can't believe it was ever like that," Seth whispers, because if he's going to die, he's going to die honest since he hasn't really told the truth any other day in his life.

"I did," Richie says, reaches over and cups Seth's jaw, smiles at him sadly. "But I was wrong."

"You can't expect to keep us here," Kate says then, looking at the Gods with so much defiance you'd think she was looking at a bouncer refusing to let her into the club. "I won't give you a child."

"You have no choice," Mictlantecuhtli says. "Free will is an allusion, my dear Kate. We made you, so we can do as we please with you."

"You did not make me," Kate says.

Mictecacihuatl scoffs. "And who did? Your biblical God with his commandments and seven days nonsense?"

"Maybe not Him specifically," Kate says. "But someone like Him. Someone who _isn't_ you. You aren't Gods. You're just children with power, running around and breaking things. When you get bored with one toy, you move on to the next. How pathetic."

"Watch your tongue, Kate," Mictlantecuhtli warns. "Or else I'll cut it out of your pretty little head."

"Go on and do it then," Kate sneers. "I'm not afraid of you."

Quick as a snake, Mictlantecuhtli has Kate by the hair, pulling her away from Richie and Seth, both of them calling out and reaching for her as Mictlantechutli drags her to center stage, right where Santanico did her dance routine so long ago.

"Not afraid of _me_?" the God asks. "You don't seem to get this, girl, I _am_ this world. I am many worlds. I am _creation_. I am day, I am night. I am your precious _God_. If I die, this entire world collapses. What illusions of freedom you hold are those we _allow_ , but only at a price.

"Apparently you didn't learn from Santanico's mistakes. You do not get to choose what to give us-- we do. And if you do not accept the terms, we will make you pay the same as we did with her." Mictlantecuhtli is practically spitting though he doesn't have a tongue, world swirling around them until suddenly they're not in the Titty Twister anymore, but an ancient throne room, sitting at the top of a Mayan temple, runes and pictures carved in the walls. Blood pours from fountains, and when Seth glances over he sees their friends there, staring helplessly where they're blocked from helping by a gorge of slithering, hissing snakes.

Dawn's beginning to rise on the horizon.

"There's only one fault to your plan," Kate says then, drawing Seth's attention back.

"And what's that?" Mictlantecuhtli asks.

Kate smiles. "You already made a monster out of me a long time ago."

Quick and sharp, she shoves Tara's daddy's knife up into Mictlantecuhtli's chest, straight into his heart like Seth did. Only, this time, the God gasps, drops Kate to the floor and stumbles back. He brings a hand up between his ribs, and when he pulls it away it drips black with old blood.

"You _cannot_ ," he says. "I am a _God_!"

"And my friend Tara's a Demigoddess," Kate shrugs. "A deflector. Makes sense that her daddy's knife can kill you, huh?"

"You _fool_!" Mictlantecuhtli says, tries to grab at his throne to stay upright, but he falls, his skeleton wife at his side in an instant and howling with panic. "Do you have any idea what you have just done?!"

Kate smirks. "Killed you, it looks like."

Mictlantecuhtli opens his mouth wider, stars from the sky pouring in through the temple's doors, but instead of resting inside of him, they begin to consume him whole. Black blood pours out of every extremity, and his wife's too since they're cut from the same cloth. Both of them begin screaming, trying to put themselves back together but they just fall apart again. The stars inside of them swirl and smash against their bones, until suddenly they explode in a burst of light.

Mictlantecuhtli, King of the Underworld, Lord of the Night, and former master of Santancio gives one final howl of agony before he is gone with just a snap of the fingers, leaving nothing behind in his wake.

"Well I'll be damned," Seth says, looking over at Kate with wide, proud eyes. "You did it!"

For a moment Kate does nothing but kneel where the God dropped her before bursting into nothingness, but then she smiles, lets out a shriek of victory and Seth feels it as their friends rush in around him, glances back and sees the pit of snakes is gone as they begin to cheer.

Seth looks down at Richie then, sees him studying his hands, squinting.

"What is it?" Seth asks.

"I'm not twenty-twenty anymore," Richie says.

"What?" Seth asks.

"I'm human," Richie answers simply, squints up at him in an expression Seth remembers he always made when he didn't have his glasses.

And for a moment Seth doesn't get what he's saying, but then it computes, and Seth lets out of a cheer of joy, throws his arms around his brother, and hugs him so hard Richie's bones pop.

Richie hugs him back, laughing and crying as the others surround them, Kate stumbling over and joining in the hug.

They're all still celebrating when the place where Mictlantecuhtli vanished rips open like someone's pulled a zipper in the universe, bright white light spilling out and beginning to suck up the temple around them.

He probably said _shit_ fifty times at the Titty Twister that night.

He'll say it fifty more now.

Everyone stops their festivities to look over, watches as the thrones get sucked up into what is essentially a black hole, only it's filled with exploding stars and appears more like noon light spilling through a windowpane, just like the noontime light spilling into the temple from outside.

"Please tell me that's just going to destroy the underworld and nothing else," Libby says.

Tara shakes her head. "That right there is going to destroy the entire universe."

"I fucked up," Kate says, blinking at the gaping mass as it sucks in another pillar, the temple beginning to crumble around them.

"Yeah," Seth says. "You kinda did, princess." He's so busy looking at the hole that he doesn't hear what Richie says next to him, glances down at his brother and blinks. "Come again?"

"They require sacrifice," Richie says. "One pure of heart."

" _What_?" Seth asks, knows what he means but isn't willing to admit it.

"That's what they wanted," Richie says, looks up and laughs. "And that's what they'll get."

"You're not serious," Freddie says. "We are not sacrificing Kate."

"Don't I get a say in it?" Kate asks. "If it'll save the universe--"

"No," Seth interrupts her.

"But Seth--"

" _No_ ," he says again.

"It doesn't have to be Kate," Richie says.

"Then who?" Florence asks. "See anyone else around here pure of heart? Freddie and Tara shoot people for a living. So do I. Dusty's been killing since he was five. Marie's used civilians as bait. Libby watches fucking Degrassi for God's sake. Aziza ditched her kid for revenge. And Seth is a fucking bastard."

"Thanks," everyone says.

"Well," Florence throws out her arms, daring them to disagree.

"I've killed people," Kate answers.

"And yet you're still full of light. Even if you are a monster, you're still a preacher's daughter, Katie," Tara laughs, but she's sort of crying again and it ruins it.

"You forgot about me," Richie says then.

Seth snorts. "You were a goddamn vampire for almost four years, Richard. Shut up."

"Technically I was just absolved of the curse, Seth. I was cleansed. Do you know how Gods curse and cure people?" Richie asks.

"With voodoo?" Seth answers.

"With _light_ ," Freddie inputs. "A special kind. The kind from the stars. The kind they bless people with, too. Like Kate. And Richie."

Something in Seth's gut twists-- he looks up at his brother and wife, at both of them waiting for him to decide.

"No," he says, shaking his head. "No way. _No_."

"It's not just us here, Seth," Richie says. "It's the entire world."

"I said no!" Seth screams, reaches out and grabs Richie's shirt, shaking him. "You hear me, no!"

"Seth," Kate says, sets a hand on his shoulder and he hates that it calms his body when he's so very angry and afraid. "One of us has to."

"No," Seth says again, but it's less of a yell and more of a sob. "Don't make me choose."

"You don't have to," Richie says, standing. "I'm choosing for you."

Kate glances at him, waits expectantly, but Richie just leans in and kisses her long and slow, before turning and doing the same to Seth. Seth kisses him back with everything he's got, because he knows this is it, because he knows that the reason Richie thought he wasn't good enough, the reason Richie left, is because Seth never gave his brother room to make his own choices.

He held on so tight, so afraid of loosing Richie, that he smothered him. He always told him to do it faster, do it better, just like dad. He was so afraid of becoming their father, that he did anyways. Maybe there was good intent behind it, but it was wrong. All Richie ever wanted was to be found-- to be _free_.

And instead Seth caged him instead, protected and nurtured and held on too tight, the infamous Gecko weakness.

When Richie pulls away, he sets something in Seth's hand-- it's the knife, the fucking, goddamn knife that's been here from the beginning. The one he dropped after trying to stab Mictlantecuhtli, the one that he's going to kill his brother with.

"It has to be a sacrifice," Richie says.

"I know," Seth answers.

Richie smiles. "You finally _see_."

"I ain't ever gonna let you get taken away from me," Seth always promised Richie late in the night.

"Even you can't save me from yourself," Richie said back.

Now Seth gets what Richie meant.

Seth wants to die with him.

He wants to die with his brother and let it all be done.

"No," Richie says, nods over his shoulder to where Kate's standing with the others, ready to leave the temple and run for their lives. "You gotta take care of our girl."

"Oh so my wife's _our_ girl now?" Seth banters, wants to make this funny because he's got nothing left.

"Yeah," Richie grins. "Yours and mine. But I love her more."

"No way," Seth laughs, new round of tears rushing down his face.

Richie laughs too, his own eyes red from crying as he stands up in front of the light, takes Seth's hand and angles the knife in it at his chest. "Stay, for her, Seth. You're all she's got."

"I'm all _you_ 've got," Seth answers, crying softly, turning his head down to choke back a sob. "You're all I've ever had."

"You have Kate, too," Richie says, and he looks so very sad and happy at the same time it's heart-breaking. "I know you've never replaced me. I know you didn't forget. Not for a second."

"Never," Seth says. "Please, don't do this, Richie."

"I have to, big brother," Richie says. "And you have to get out of here. You have to _live_ , for the both of us. Take Kate and get away from all of this."

Seth takes a deep breath, knows he can't do this, he _can't_. Richie is his brother, his goddamn _brother_ , his family, his--

\--Kate puts a hand on his shoulder, and when he looks back at her, he sees it there, everything they are and have ever been.

_I'm coming with._

She's never left him, not through all of this, and he knows, he _knows_ he can't leave her. Not when they've just found each other the way Seth and Richie never could. Richie wanted to save Kate, has from the start, and that's what he's doing. Maybe he doesn't get to die rich and fat or in the arms of a beautiful woman, but he gets to die _saving_ one, saving his brother and the woman he loves.

People always do stupid things for love, so the saying goes.

"Go. I wanna see how it ends," Richie smirks, seeing the acceptance on Seth's face.

"Did you really just Buffy me?" Seth laughs through his tears, the knife raised high at his side but he's waiting, just...waiting.

Richie grins. "Spike, actually. Gotta keep you on your toes, brother."

"Yeah," Seth says. "You were always good at that."

The chuckle that escapes Richie's throat in answer hurts so much that again Seth doesn't know if he can really do it. How can he ever kill his brother, the one that's always been there? Seth's been in a car with a beautiful boy nearly all his life, and he's always wanted to tell the boy he loves him, but he never could. Maybe he was never supposed to-- it's just a road story, after all. A downright shoot 'em up. Blood on the third knuckle and swallowing glass like a crisp bottle of beer.

"Maybe I'll come find you in another life," Richie says then, eyes shining in the light beckoning from beyond him like a bad cliche.

"The Gecko brothers _will_ ride again," Seth says, and before Richie can answer, he steps forwards and shoves the knife up and up, right into his brother's heart.

Richie gasps, reaches out in those final moments and touches Seth's face with trembling fingers. "And that, brother," he says. "Is a beautiful thing."

He falls back into the light and the world swallows him whole like a bone-white afternoon, leaving Seth alone and inconsolable.

"You're not alone." Something grabs his arm and tries to pull him out of the dirt. "You're not alone, Seth. Now get up. We have to go."

It's Kate who's grabbing him of course, always Kate who's picking up the pieces Richie seems to splinter Seth into without even trying.

"I can't leave him," Seth says, the temple still shaking around them even though the end of the world is nigh. If Seth weren't so numb, he'd think it's funny they ended up in Temple of Doom once more.

"He's gone," Kate whispers. "But _you're_ still here. I'm still here."

_I'm coming with._

Seth gets up and starts moving, doesn't look back as the temple collapses behind them.

"Do you think you'll ever be able to let him go?" she asked him a long time, driving endless miles of highway before them.

"No," he answered, honest for once in a long time. "No, I don't."

Somehow they make it back into the real world.

Everything is Xibalba is either dead or doesn't want to mess with the people that killed it.

Over two hundred people went in, and only nine plus the stupid dog come out. They stumble up through some portal, not the one they went in through, but a new one in the neighborhood outside of the temple that's magically turned into a jungle.

When they all blink into the sun, the _real_ sun, they realize they're standing at the base of a Maya ruin, having come out some side-door built into the ground. A few hours of walking gets them to civilization, rented out motel rooms, food, a bed, a shower.

Seth's too numb to think about anything.

He eats the burger Kate gets him, lets her scrub the blood off of him in the tub. When she lays him down on the bed he falls asleep out of sheer exhaustion. He wakes up and she has breakfast, says that time must move differently in Xibalba because they've been gone for a month instead of the original day they thought they were.

"Happy anniversary," Kate says. "We met four years ago today."

Seth's too tired to understand what she's talking about and falls back asleep.

People start going home a week later after they figure out everything that resulted from killing all the Gods. The curse is broken, it turns out, exactly what most who went to the Underworld with them were hoping for. Hunters from all over the world set up a calling tree, say they can't find a vampire in sight.

There are other things though, other curses left to break, but the vampires? They're gone, and that's the biggest thing that matters.

Freddie is the first to leave, goes back to his wife and children to break the news of Miguel. He tells Kate to call him any time she needs him, sets a reassuring hand on Seth's shoulder but Seth can't even look at the Ranger, too sick with grief. Aziza leaves right after to finally go home to her daughter in Africa because she feels safe now and says she think her husband can finally rest in peace. Dusty takes off with Marie because they're used to working in teams; they say there's always monsters to go for and that they're not quite ready to settle down, that they'll call with the news and visit every couple of months. Florence leaves to go home to her son; Kate lets her take the dog, for protection and to help ease Miguel's loss to Ishaan. Florence says she's going to retire, and that she's going to make the dog lazy and fat. Kate grins so hard it looks like it hurts her face.

"You be a good boy, Sargent Frost," Kate says as she kneels down in front of the mutt and lets him lick her face all over, crying softly but also wagging his tail. Kate laughs and hugs the creature, and when it looks over her shoulder up at Seth he knows it's saying _I was wrong. You_ can _come back,_ but Seth's too tired to listen.

Kate gives the dog's leash to Florence then, and after they go she starts crying, but Seth doesn't know how to hold her and make it better. He wonders why she gave the dog away if she's going to miss him so much, and gets his answer later that night that she knows she can't take care of it right now, that she can't even take care of herself and doesn't know how to take care of him.

Seth still can't hold her.

Tara is the last to leave with Libby the following morning-- they plan to go around the world and tell the fallen hunters' families about what happened, break the news in person.

"You call me every week," Tara says, hugging Kate goodbye. "Hear me, Gecko? Every week."

"Of course," Kate says, glances over at Seth nervously but he says nothing, doesn't even hug Tara back.

The woman sighs into his ear for it, pulls away and reaches up to touch his cheek. "It gets easier," she whispers. "I promise, it does."

Kate waits another two days before she drags Seth out into the middle of the desert somewhere, and starts to dig a random hole in the ground.

Seth watches blankly from where he's sitting on the hood of the car, recognizes the item of clothing Kate pulls out of her pocket and sticks in the hole instantly-- Richie's glasses.

Seth dashes for them before she can shovel dirt on top. "Where did you get these?" he asks, plucking them up form the hole and clutching them close.

"Richie," Kate says. "He gave them to me that first time we saw him again. For a keepsake. I didn't know how to tell you."

"Why are you burying them then?" Seth asks, and he can feel it, that crashing wave of grief stumbling through his senses.

He doesn't _want_ to feel it though, doesn't want this to be real, wants to hold on to the numbness for just a little while longer.

"Because I need to say goodbye," Kate says.

"What about me?" Seth asks, and all of a sudden he's kind of yelling, yelling at her in the middle of the open desert, the sun beating down on him and making him sweat, making her sweat, both of them hurting and exhausted. "What if I don't _want_ to say goodbye?"

"You have to," Kate whispers. "There's nothing else to do."

Seth blinks, drops the glasses quite suddenly and walks back to the car, gets in the passenger seat, slams the door closed. He starts hitting every available surface including himself then, yelling and screaming and sobbing because Kate's right, there's nothing else to do.

He watches as she buries the glasses carefully, marks them with a cross made by two strips of wood nailed together. By now he's crying so hard he's choking, his chest tight and hollow as he watches Kate take off the cross from around her neck and drape it over the one in the ground. She touches it for a moment before standing up and getting back in the car.

They drive while Seth's still crying, and eventually he passes out.

He grieves for a month.

He can't really tell the days from the nights, just lays in a state of nothingness. Kate tries to get him to do things at first, but eventually she gives up, says that if he wants her to leave, then he needs to tell her to leave.

"I know it's my fault," she says. "I should've taken his place."

Seth doesn't know how to tell her that's not true, that Richie wanted to save her and that in truth he wanted Richie to save her. Kate mistakes his silence for scorn, walks out and slams the door.

He thinks she's left him until she crawls back into bed with him twelve hours later, wraps her arms around him and curls into his back. "I'm sorry," she whispers. "I'm grieving too, and I know it isn't as bad but--"

"Don't say that," Seth whispers, taking her hands in his and holding her close. "You loved him. He loved you. It _sucks_."

"Yeah," Kate says. "It does."

Seth goes to visit the make-shift grave Kate made for his brother when she finally can't stand all the sitting around and goes into the next town over to buy God knows what, leaving Seth to nothing but television and week-old take out.

He gathers all his courage and goes, kneels down by the cross and touches the miniature one draped around it, already worn from the elements. He's surprised Kate parted with it, considering it was all she had left of her family.

"You idiot. You _are_ her family."

Seth glances over his shoulder so quick he thinks he's given himself whiplash for a moment, but then his vision settles through the glare of the sun and he sees Richie, standing right there behind him, smiling. His hair's slicked back and he's got his glasses on and he's wearing the stupid Bible salesman suit while smoking a cigarette.

"Richie, you're--" Seth starts.

"Alive?" Richie laughs, and for a moment Seth dares to hope-- "No, I'm not."

Seth's heart sinks, everything hurting. "Have I gone crazy?"

"Not unless it runs in the family now," Richie says, blowing out smoke. "But I'm pretty sure that's just alcoholism."

"Don't give me any ideas," Seth jokes, figures if he has gone crazy he may as well enjoy it. "So if you're not alive, what are you? A ghost?"

"Sorta," Richie shrugs. "I'm not really sure myself. But you'll never believe what the afterlife is really like, man."

"Is Santanico there?" Seth asks, because he wants Richie to at least have someone, a someone who understands him and loves him even if that bitch still makes Seth jealous as hell.

Richie grins. "Yep. And all our friends. They say hi. Oh, and Jacob and Scott. They say hi, too. Especially to Kate."

"And dad?" Seth asks.

"Could be," Richie says. "But you only see the others that you want to."

"So you actually went to heaven?" Seth snorts, so easy to banter even now.

"I guess?" Richie chuckles. "I don't know, maybe. I still like calling it El Rey. It's like a do-over, the chance to be someone new, someone _good_."

"Are you happy?" Seth asks.

"Are _you_?" Richie counters, flicks his cigarette butt away.

"I miss you like hell," Seth says.

"And so you're driving Kate off," Richie answers.

"I'm not--" Seth tries, but he knows Richie's right. Even after that night they held each other last week, he still can't bring himself to do anything more with her. She asked him to go with her today and he just laid there, feigning sleep. All he does is sleep and grieve anymore and he doesn't even bother to tell her it's not her fault. "I don't know how to fix it. There's a hole between us the size of you, you dickhead. I don't know how to _fix it_."

"You'll figure it out," Richie says, turns and waves a hand flippantly over his shoulder. "Everyone thought I was the planner, but it was always you, Seth."

Seth realizes as Richie takes a few steps that that means he's leaving, and suddenly his entire world goes crashing and he's crazy to get him to stay. "Richie! Wait!"

"Yeah, brother?" Richie asks, turning to raise a brow and grin at Seth warmly.

"Do I really taste like shit?" Seth asks, because he can't think of anything else.

Richie laughs, this long, deep, happy laugh that Seth has missed so much since it disappeared when they had to grow up too young. "Whiskey and molasses, brother. D _is_ -g _us_ -t _ing_." He turns back and keeps walking then, shape beginning to shimmer into the sun.

"I love you, Richie," Seth says.

"I love you too, Seth," Richie says, but he's already gone.

 

Seth doesn't tell Kate about what he saw.

He doesn't tell her because she's not back and he's packing his bag and he's going to leave everything behind him. Everything that hurts and isn't good.

He writes her a note.  _Airport two towns over. Meet me there. Or don't. It's your choice. I love you._

It's worth a shot, he figures. If she doesn't show, then she doesn't show.

Seth really wants her to show up, though.

 

Seth still remembers those first few months they had together, how it was so easy to fall into a comfortable routine with her.

It's always been that way with Kate-- always been easy. Maybe not the situations they get themselves into, but just the two of them, together. Things aren't complicated when it's just him and her. He still remembers that time they were laying together when she came back after taking off for a bit the first time. How she asked him what it would have been like if they'd met in a different place, different time, different realm. She'd said he wouldn't have touched her, would've taken one look and named her jail bait and walked away, and he knew she was right.

But goddamn how he's glad they never met then, because despite all the bullshit they've been through, they've been through it  _together_. He got her into this mess, but she came along willingly and she stayed. Kate's the only person who has ever truly stayed and never given up on him.

“I can’t get rid of it,” he told her once, trying to explain how he couldn't get the sadness out.

“Me neither,” she answered. “But we can keep trying.”

And he hasn't wanted to stop trying since, not really.

Seth waits and waits and waits for her, and for a while he's afraid she's not coming, that she didn't get his note. But then suddenly there she is, breathing hard and running up to him through the airport waiting deck, stopping when they're just an inch apart.

"He's gone," Seth says, because there's nothing else left to say. He tried to be poetic and rehearse this, but that's as far as he got. "He was all I've got and he's gone."

Kate shakes her head, green, green eyes shining in an explosion of light. "You still got me," she says.

Seth blinks, looking up at her through mud and glass and blood and he's finally, finally able to _see_ the way Richie was talking about.

Because all this time they've been battling monsters and pulling each other out of burning buildings and despite what they've said, what they've whispered in secret like horrible, painful pillow talk, she's always come through for him. Maybe they were all just trying to be holy, in a way. Maybe that's why Seth picked a preacher's daughter to build his life with.

Because everyone needs a place, and Seth thought that his was with Richie. But you can't make a home inside of someone else, and despite his initial thinking, Kate has taught him that. She's taught him that you can make a home _with_ someone, side by side.

Kate has helped him pull the bodies from the lake and dress them in warm clothes again. She's taught him how to be left with his hands after trying to throw his sadness away. They've come so very close to death and somehow he loves her even more for it, even though he was a man who thought himself incapable of that. And when they role on the floor and clutch their bellies, it can mean laughter, not poison. Monsters are always hungry, but she slams her body into his and it reminds him that he's alive, still living even after walking through Hell.

Seth never could get Richie to kill him, but he's worn this stupid sweat jacket for the longest time. Now he takes it off and drapes it over Kate's shoulders, figures it fits her better anyways. Because all this, and love too, has not ruined them. It has been bumps and scrapes the way he first promised her it wouldn't be, but they've made it through.

So maybe it's a graveyard of a bone white afternoon, but Tara has always been too poetic for her own good and it's the reason Seth loves her despite the fact she tried to cop a feel on his wife. Hell, he even loves Freddie and Marie and Dusty and Aziza and Libby and Florence and Ishaan and the fucking dog, and misses Miguel when he really thinks about it. He also misses Adam, Tico, Nadir, Anna, Pierre, Rufus, Dad, Scott, Jacob, _Richie_ \-- even Santanico too, and all the others who sacrificed themselves because they were sad and angry and wanted everyone to be alive again.

But this is the part where he puts that behind him, where he gives Kate something more than a catalog of non-definitive acts and desperation. This is the part where he gives up that dream of being in the golden room where everyone finally gets what they want, because really no one gets everything they want, and Seth's accepted that. He's accepted that he never had a chance of getting his brother back, not from the moment where two boys and a preacher's family walked into a bar that was open from dusk till dawn looking for salvation and God when those things were right here in Kate's eye all along.

Richie's found his El Rey, and so can they.

And yeah, okay, so maybe they're inconsolable. Maybe he's saved forgiveness a plate of that goddamn shepherd's pie for a little too long, but it's finally quit milling around the yard and has come inside.

"I bought two tickets," Seth says, looks over at her and gives her anything, everything. "I bought two tickets and I love you. I l _ove you_ , Kate. I always have, if I'm being honest with myself. Right from the start. I want you to come with me."

"Where?" Kate asks.

"Anywhere," Seth says. "Everywhere. But mainly Europe and shit, because I'm still wanted in the states. But _where_ doesn't matter, Kate. I just want you. I love you. Come with me."

"Seth," she says, and if he looks he can still see the seventeen year old girl in her that's lost everything because of him.

It hurts, but he's just doing it to himself and he's got to stop that, has to stop being the dragon and be the hero instead.

"Do you still hate me?" he asks, because he remembers that second hunt where she told him that. He has her forgiveness, but maybe that's not enough. Maybe forgiveness means nothing without love.

She smiles. "No."

"Then stay," he whispers, grabs her hand and squeezes so tight that he could pop her stitches all over again.

Kate looks up at the terminal where the flight is boarding, and he holds his breath. He thinks that maybe she wanted a better story, and he can't blame her for that. But she's a lover standing too close to focus on, and he also thinks that they can do anything, that they struggle because their hearts aren't too big, but that's okay.

It's okay.

They've touched the stars, they're forgiven, not from the absence of violence, but despite the abundance of it. And there's a litany of dreams that happens somewhere in the middle, the light's no longer mysterious, but that's okay too.  

It's not exactly a fairy tale, but the story underneath the story. They've all made these ridiculous idols so they can see what's behind them, but they've gone up the ladder now, stared at what's horrible and forgiven it. There was the river, and here is the box, and what's leftover is no longer the monsters they put in the box to test their strength with.

But what happens next?

They keep the monsters out, Seth thinks, make all the words up themselves. A place for them to love, and it's their own kingdom, their own El Rey that they do not have to catalog. Dawn, light, a hunter's heart. All this time it's like they've wanted to hurt each other, but the victory is that they could not stomach it. They've swallowed Richie up like an infection and it's still beautiful, they're still whole, just a little picked apart.

This is the vision Richie always talked about. Seth can finally see that they're nothing more than souls made of flesh and light, and it sets him free. This is the moon, the sun. And Seth would have named the stars for his brother, but now he knows he was always meant to name them for Kate, too.

There's a road map spread out before them, just a terminal away.

Kate looks back, she looks back and Seth can see it all just like he did back in that temple, everything they've ever been and ever will be right down to the last moment where she laughs, squeezes his hand and says, "I'm coming with."

The breath rushes out of Seth's lungs, because that's all he's ever needed-- someone to realize he's fragile, the kind of fragile that gets broken down but they're willing to build back up. It took the touch of a girl with frosting on her fingertips to make him realize that-- the touch of a girl who's always come through.

"I can't make promises of no bumps or scrapes this time, princess," Seth says.

"I don't want promises," Kate answers. "I want _you_."

Seth touches her wedding ring, the simple golden band with flames etched into it. "Well," he says, looks up at her with a trade-mark smirk. "Let's get ramblin'."

"You're an idiot," Kate says, but she's laughing and following him down the terminal hall, hands still clasped, bodies pressed close, side by side.

And as they're walking through a labyrinth of darkness for the last time, they let it go. They let go of the hurt and the blood and the mud and the glass, the loss and tragedy sewn into their sleeves. They have fixed each other, sewn each other up and have matching scars to show for it.

So they let go of dusk and walk through an open door into the dawn of a new morning, a new beginning spread out before them, a chance for something good.

 _We did it, Richie,_ Seth thinks as the sun warms his face when they step out onto the landing strip, breathing in crisp Mexican air for the last time-- this country always was too hot for him. _We both found what we were looking for, Richie. It was never blue agave or riches. It was_ love _\-- it was feeling like we belong. And I do belong. I belong with our girl, always have, always will. And I know you know that. I know you're happy where you are._

When Seth looks over to the side of the landing strip he can see Richie smiling at him in answer-- his brother gives a small wave, cigarette in hand, before glancing happily at Kate and walking away until he vanishes, and Seth knows this will be the last time he'll see Richie for a while, and that's okay, too.

_I know you're free, Richie; I'm glad. Goodbye._

"Hey," Kate says, tugs Seth's hand and nods over her shoulder to the plane waiting for them. He realizes he's crying when she reaches up to touch his face, finally has the nerve after all this time. "You sure you want me to go? Sure you want some company?"

Seth looks at her, really looks at her-- sees the shine of tears in her eyes too, the forgiveness and the love. "Yeah," he grins; he's never been more sure of anything in his life.

Kate kisses him before they start walking again, and Seth knows that this means their story is not tragic, that this is not the end. He knows that this means they're going forward.

They're not going back.

**  
The End.**

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> So that's it. That's the end. I'm dead inside.
> 
> But I guess that in all truth, it has been wonderful writing this drabble series. It has been wonderful reading your comments and getting your support. I hope you loved this series as much as me. I'm gonna miss it. I dedicate it all to you readers and my ot3 that will never ever die even after the television series is long over (which hopefully isn't for a very long time). Thank you, everyone, for coming with.


End file.
